To You
by Blackrose715378
Summary: The words left unsaid are usually the most important.
1. Chapter 1

Max:

I love you. The way I feel about you scares me, honestly, because I know I place too much importance on our interactions, especially because I suspect that I'm just another one of your games- another girl that only holds your interest because you think you can't have me. Or at least because I act like you can't. If you knew how I felt, would you lose interest? At the end of the day, when everything is low, you're what makes me hold on, you're what makes me smile when all I can see is bleakness all around me. I hate you for having this effect on me. I hate you because I love you. And one day, when you disappear from my life, probably without warning, I'll hate you because the spark that's left inside me might die out. So much has had an effect on me that I hate you for being the one bright point in my life. Because a single point is fragile, and can go out at any time. I hate you as much as I love you, and I don't know what I want. I know I can't let myself say what I want, because even if we both felt the same way, it would never work, and then we'd be over anyway. But if I wait around, if I just keep hiding what I'm feeling for you, what the hell am I going to do when you finally find someone? Because I know you. And I know that you are kind and thoughtful as much as you try to hide it, and what girl doesn't want you? So I wonder. What will I do when you do find someone? Because that will probably mean the end to what we have, whatever that is, anyway. I know that years from now, your name will just be a small reminder of some guy that I was in love with once, and I might smile as I think of you and then move on to whatever I was doing before that, but I don't want that. I want everything to freeze in time until I figure out what the hell I want. Because all I know is that I don't want to lose you. And I have to figure out how not to do that. And that will take time. Because in the end, who don't you lose?

-Me

Glad to get that out of her system, she crumpled up the note and tossed it in the garbage. Looking around her office one last time, she turned off the lights and locked the door behind her. That night she would board a plane to Europe and that was the end of that. Her career would go on, and her life would follow. As her high heels clicked down the corridors of N-Tek one last time, she was unaware of a young man turning off stealth mode and reaching into the garbage can.


	2. Chapter 2

How many times had he re-read the note? Five? Ten? More? It had been three months since she left. He knew that because not a single day went by when he didn't count them up again, since he didn't feel the gap that she left when she went.

His performance had suffered. Jeff noticed, Berto noticed, and Kat sure as **hell** noticed. He knew he couldn't go on like this much longer- he couldn't do his job as well as he should be able to, and his father had informed him that his distraction was putting him **and **his team in danger. He either had to move on, or do something about it.

He had decided to move on. Or at least he thought he had. He'd tried dating a few times, but no girl could hold his interest for very long. None of them seemed interesting to him anymore. He knew they weren't the problem.

He decided to forget- to not think of her. She had left. She didn't care about him. There was no reason for him to stay wrapped up in memories of her. Still his head snapped around every time someone mentioned her name.

He decided to be angry. Apparently he was worthless to her. How could she leave without saying goodbye? What gave her the right, after all they'd been through? He cursed her all day long, telling himself that even if she did come back- even if she begged him to forgive her, admitted she was wrong, he wouldn't give her a second glance. But his thoughts were always of her when he drifted off to sleep at the end of the day.

He decided to wake up. No one was surprised when he requested a week off. They all seemed relieved- had they known before he did that he couldn't get by without her? It didn't matter.

The flight to Europe seemed to take forever, even though it was only three hours as the Hawk flew. He still had no idea what he would say, how he would convince her to come back, how he would handle seeing her again after so long. He stopped thinking about the details. All he knew was that he was going to see her again after so long. And that was all that mattered.

It had been another long day for Rachel. Her new job was nothing like she had imagined it. At N-Tek she had been a big fish in a small pond- she was respected, she had a good position, she was well-known and well-liked among her co-workers. Here everything was different. The European base served the UK, France, Germany, Spain, and Portugal, and was humongous. After three months she still got lost, and didn't know three quarters of the faces she passed in the hallways each day. Her position was centered around paperwork, and she rarely had any human interaction during the day. She'd been miserable. All day long she thought about the Del Oro Bay base, the people she had known, the job she had worked her way up to for so long. But she was comforted at least in knowing that she had been able to leave. Max would be able to live his life with fewer complications, and she wouldn't have to know when he finally chose someone who wasn't her.

Letting herself into her gloomy office- only one of the overhead lights worked, she felt her spirits deflate even further upon taking in the amount of work that had been dropped on her desk while she was out. The clock already read 7 PM, and she knew she would most likely be here all night. Holding back what would have almost certainly been a sob, she sat down and focused herself on the task at hand. Or at least she did, before she saw the piece of paper on top of everything. Obviously crumpled at one time, it had been smoothed out carefully over and over again until the paper was soft to the touch- more like cloth than the material it had actually been written on.

She read the words she had written what seemed like years ago, transported to the last time she had sat in her office at N-Tek, convinced she was doing the right thing. Her eyes filled with tears as she felt the urge to go back in time and tell herself not to come here- not to give up the life that had meant so much to her.

When she felt the arms wrap around her from behind the chair, she at first thought it must have been wishful thinking- she must have lost it and was imaging the person she wanted to see the most at that point. She leaned into them anyway, and let herself go as she realized that it was really him.

"Come back with me."

He didn't have to ask twice.


End file.
